Library of Congress Set to Archive Every Public Tweet In History | News

Remember that debatable tweet you posted but then you decided to delete it from the memory banks of cyberspace forever? Well that never really happens, and now the U.S. Library of Congress will make sure of it. Every public tweet from the beginning of Twitter history (March 2006) will be digitally archived at the Library’s site in Washington D.C. and will be available to anyone with a library card.

According to Library spokesperson Jennifer Gavin, the concept’s plans were first announced two years but hasn’t officially been activated done to some bugs. The Library is working to figure out how to make every run smoothly. “The process of how to serve it out to researchers is still being worked out, but we’re getting a lot closer,” Gavin told the Nieman Journalism Lab. “I couldn’t give you a date specific of when we’ll be ready to make the announcement.”

Gavin also states that they’ve been receiving material on a daily basis. “And of course, as I think is obvious to anyone who follows Twitter, it has ended up being a very large amount of material.” …LARGE being an understatement. Twitter has processed billions of tweets and currently manages an average of 400 million tweets day, according to its CEO. We’re talking a superabundance of material being collected here.

How will the tweets be used? Basically for research purposes. Twitter clarifies in a blog post that “it should be noted that there are some specifics regarding this arrangement. Only after a six-month delay can the Tweets be used for internal library use, for non-commercial research, public display by the library itself, and preservation.”

The folks at Twitter are happy to donate the Library access and fully support the idea. They look forward to becoming apart of history.

What do you think about this decision? Let us know your thoughts in the comment box below. Oh, and watch what you tweet. The FEDS are watching.